


the last of the real ones

by dottie_wan_kenobi



Series: isolated batfam/teen titans au [2]
Category: New Teen Titans, Teen Titans (Comics)
Genre: Angst, Body Image, Friendship, Gen, Insecurity, Male-Female Friendship, Minor Suicidal Thoughts, POV Victor Stone, Self-Hatred, Teen Titans as Family, he's got some trauma to work thru, mentioned body horror, the path to healing, this is a teenaged boy who was turned into a robot after almost dying
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-02
Updated: 2020-04-02
Packaged: 2021-02-28 20:15:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23443069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dottie_wan_kenobi/pseuds/dottie_wan_kenobi
Summary: Gar is like a blessing. He doesn’t seem to notice the shiny parts of Vic, not until it really counts—when there’s wires sticking out, something shoved through Vic like it was nothing, when he’s in danger. And even then, he treats them like any other part of the body, like a wound is a wound and it doesn’t matter that it’s not flesh, but technology.When he asks, Gar tells him about Cliff Steele, and shrugs like it’s nothing. “I’m just used to robot guys, I guess,” he says, flippant like he’s not the first person Vic has met who didn’t recoil at the sight of him.Vic manages a laugh, his eye—his real eye, his human eye—stinging.
Relationships: Dick Grayson & Koriand'r & Garfield Logan & Raven & Victor Stone, Victor Stone & Donna Troy
Series: isolated batfam/teen titans au [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1686337
Comments: 4
Kudos: 100





	the last of the real ones

**Author's Note:**

> this might be OOC and idk if it makes sense bc it's 3 am but kdsjfdskfhasjkfh I love Vic and I wanted to write about him and this thing just wrote itself I s2g. idk where all these words came from. ~~my unending well of love~~. this isn't even what I was planning on writing, bc I wanted a Kory & Vic fic, and this turned out to be much more Donna & Vic but. whatever.
> 
> anyway this fic is officially anti Vic being a founding member of the JL. he's a teen titan for now and for always. this is his family, DC, and you stole him away from his family. fuck u. dskjfsdjfhkdjfhksdfjkash
> 
> WARNINGS: Vic has a few passively suicidal thoughts, basically just that he wishes he hadn't survived his accident. It's mostly at the beginning, w one way down near the end.
> 
> title is from The Last of The Real Ones by Fall Out Boy and only kind of has anything to do w this fic

Vic still cringes when he looks in the mirror. He doesn’t think there’ll ever be a time when he doesn’t.

It’s easier to avoid his reflection.

Even then, all it takes to remember is to look down—there’s no escaping his own legs, his own body which isn’t even his anymore.

He should’ve died, and that’s nothing more than a fact. He should’ve died. He didn’t. He’s still here. 

He wishes his dad would’ve just let him die.

Gar is like a blessing. He doesn’t seem to notice the shiny parts of Vic, not until it really counts—when there’s wires sticking out, something shoved through Vic like it was nothing, when he’s in danger. And even then, he treats them like any other part of the body, like a wound is a wound and it doesn’t matter that it’s not flesh, but technology.

When he asks, Gar tells him about Cliff Steele, and shrugs like it’s nothing. “I’m just used to robot guys, I guess,” he says, flippant like he’s not the first person Vic has met who didn’t recoil at the sight of him.

Vic manages a laugh, his eye—his real eye, his human eye—stinging.

It’s stupid. It’s so fucking stupid.

He used to be so happy with himself. An athlete, top of his class, well-liked by his peers. His friends would fist bump him, would tackle and play wrestle, and it was so easy to just…be. Girls would smile at him, and teachers would call on him to answer questions, and no one hated him, no one at all.

Raven asks him to show her how to make toast, and he ends up standing there next to her in front of the toaster, trying not to look at it. It’s only partly because watched toast won’t pop.

His dad made this tower, and he made or bought a lot of the stuff inside it, and for some fucking reason he thought it would be fun to make everything the same shiny chrome he made Vic.

Gar ruined the microwave, so thankfully there is one appliance he can tolerate the sight of. Well, two: the coffee machine is a close second.

Raven hums, reaching out to touch the toaster. There’s a reflection of her finger.

“Kinda ugly, isn’t it,” he says, unable to help himself.

“No,” she replies. No hesitation at all. “Just different. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

The toaster pops before he can say anything.

He and Donna go out shopping. It’s embarrassing, to be wearing a hat and a long coat and gloves this early into the fall, but without it he’s sure people would be running from them. Donna is intimidating in her own right, tall and built. People stare at her as they walk through the store, and it feels nice to not have attention on him for once.

Vic Stone, not wanting attention. Couldn’t ever dream of it.

She leads them to the makeup section, arm in arm, and they stop in front of the wall of foundation.

“This isn’t gonna work,” he says, eyeing the products warily.

“It’s worth a shot,” she insists. They don’t detangle even as she leans down to grab different shades. She holds them up to his face until she finds the right one.

He slips away while she goes to buy it, standing in front of the magazine rack.

There isn’t a single cover with a person he can see himself in. One looks like Donna, another like Sarah, and one that he can kind of, almost see Marcy in. The men are muscled, toned, white. All of them are perfect.

Vic clenches his fists—his metal fucking fists—and turns. He walks out of the store and doesn’t punch anything even though he wants to.

When Donna finds him, she doesn’t say anything. She reaches out her hand, and when he doesn’t take it, she shakes it impatiently. “Well?”

Rolling his eyes, he takes it, and yes it definitely looks weird. His gloved hand in her bare one. He tries to pull away, something in his chest twisting, but she holds tighter, side-eyeing him hard.

They walk home to the Tower hand in hand. When they get back, Raven is just getting in from school and Gar is curled up on the couch in cat form. “Come on,” Donna says, tugging him towards her room.

He ends up sitting on the sink counter, trying to hold still while she covers the metal half of his face—the part that isn’t his face—with the foundation. It doesn’t feel like anything is happening, but the position is vulnerable, with Donna so close and _touching_ the parts of him that he hates so much.

He’s not even interested in her like that, but he can smell her perfume, and all he’s reminded of is that there’s basically no chance a woman will ever want to get close to him again.

It’s not like he can blame them.

Donna finishes up by tapping at seemingly-random spots on the metal. She steps back and has his turn to look in the mirror, and he doesn’t want to but he does it anyway because she went to all this trouble and wouldn’t even let him pay for the foundation she’ll never have any use for.

He notices two things immediately. One, despite Donna’s efforts, it’s far from perfect. The light catches on the metal for shimmering seconds, long enough for him to notice, long enough for him to know it’s not going to work.

Two.

He almost looks human again.

One of his hands comes up tentatively to touch.

It’s a metal hand—he can’t feel things with it. 

It drops back to his lap, and he turns back to Donna.

He doesn’t have to say anything.

“I’m sorry,” she says, not offering again to help him wipe it off. 

“I told you it wasn’t going to work.” He tries not to sound angry, because really he’s not—she’s just trying to help him feel better. It’s obvious, plain as day. He thinks she probably pities him, and that makes him mad, so he doesn’t think about that. Instead, he focuses on getting every bit of the makeup off the part of his face that isn’t his face, and goddammit it would be a lot better if he could just feel where the last of it is but he can’t because he’s—

She leans against the doorway, just looking at him. He hates having eyes on him, he never used to but he does now, and he can’t take hers. He’d ask her to go away, but this is her bathroom, and she’s blocking the only exit.

Avoiding her in the mirror, he looks instead at his hair. It’s human, his hair, it’s real and his. He can still grow it out. He’s still human. He’s still himself.

She points out a spot he missed, and declares it all gone, and throws the foundation out right in front of him. 

He goes back to his own room, where there are no reminders of his old self, and lays down in his bed which he can only sort of feel, and he cries, because if he can cry that means he’s still human. Even if it is only out of one eye.

There’s nothing more important to him than feeling human, these days.

Dick Grayson is an enigma and a nerd and an annoyance. He stares at Vic. Not obviously, not at all—he thinks all those years of stealth training are certainly coming in handy—but Vic can tell. 

In the pool, he watches the water, how Vic moves around in it. In the gym, he catches glimpses here and there. In the living room, his eyes keep straying from the TV.

He thinks about saying something. Dick might be Robin—and that’s a pretty big maybe, after all, considering he had brought no proof—but Vic isn’t going to be made uncomfortable in his own home. Not by someone other than himself.

Donna catches his eye.

If she says something about it, if she makes Dick pity him, he’ll—

“Hey,” she calls. “You’re missing important stuff! And I seriously don’t want to have to rewind, so start paying attention.”

Dick apologizes, turning back to the TV. He doesn’t look again, and in the morning, he’s up before everyone else, slurping coffee. When Vic steps in, he lifts his head. Looks Vic right in the eye and nowhere else. It puts him on the wrong foot, but he tries to move forward anyway.

Trying and failing to be casual, Dick says, “Good morning.”

“Hey.” Vic seriously hopes he’s not a morning person. Raven and Gar are more than enough.

“I wanted to apologize. I don’t mean to stare, it’s just—I’ve never seen anything like you.”

And yup, Vic officially should’ve stayed in bed. Scowling, he tries to decide how he’s going to deal with this—breaking the coffee machine is not ideal, but it’s looking most likely. He opens his mouth, and even though he has no idea what he’s going to say, he doesn’t expect, “Did Donna talk to you?”

“Donna? No.” Dick puts his cup down, rubs his hands against his legs awkwardly. “I’m going about this all wrong. I’m not—I’m not judging you. I don’t think you’re a freak or anything. It’s just…you look like a real superhero, I guess.”

“A real superhero,” Vic repeats, because the words just don’t make sense.

“Yeah.” Dick smiles to the counter, shrugs. He looks unbearably awkward, and it makes Vic feel a little better that he’s not the only person suddenly terrible at social interactions. “But I think I made you uncomfortable, and that’s not my intentions so I’m going to stop. Staring at you.”

“You didn’t get out much, did you.”

“No, not really.”

“Well…well, I forgive you. I guess. You’re acting like a weirdo, man.”

“Sorry.”

“You’ll get used to it soon enough,” Vic sighs, wishing it were true.

A few days later, Vic goes to Dick’s room, and spends thirty whole minutes trying to get him to wake up. It’s to no avail, the stupid guy grumbling and cursing at him, until Vic gets fed up and shoots a harmless—and very, very annoying—amount of white sound at him.

Dick jumps out of bed with a pained yelp, and complains all day about it, and pretends to be mad when Vic can’t stop laughing.

He’s walking around one night, trying to get his phantom limbs to finally go the hell away—he’s a hypocrite, he thinks, because he misses those limbs terribly and would give damn near anything to be normal again, but they hurt and if he can’t have the real thing he doesn’t want this mimicry—when he comes across a mugging. It’s an older couple, holding each other in fright as a younger man holds a gun to their faces.

Vic doesn’t even think about stepping in. 

The guy freaks, shoots.

The bullet pings off of him, and all three of them run practically screaming at the way Vic just shakes it off.

By the time he gets back to his room, the phantoms are gone but his mind won’t let go of the image of their fear—all three of them, terrified of him. The mugger should’ve been, but the couple? He was trying to help them.

His curls his fingers and thinks of his mom and the fear on her face and her awful scream, and then—then he stops thinking about it.

Gar greets him in the morning with a big smile and jokes about early birds getting the best spot in the gym, and neither one of them talk about the dark circles under their eyes.

“You’re supposed to multiply the seven-x-z,” Dick says.

“No, you’re supposed to divide,” Vic says. They’ve been at it for _ever_ , which isn’t strictly true but it sure feels that way. Arguing with a Bat is apparently a bad idea.

“You’re not, though! Don’t you see that?” Dick points at the paper, his stupid human finger tapping obnoxiously on the problem like Vic just isn’t looking at it right. “That means you’re supposed to multiply.”

“Um,” Raven says. It’s her paper, her homework actually, and she only asked that someone check the problem to make sure she did it right. Dick says she did, and Vic says she didn’t.

“What did they teach you in Gotham, man? That common core shit? Because you’re wrong.”

“Ha! No, I got the best education a billionaire could afford, thank you, and I was a mathlete, and that’s how I know I’m not—”

“Oh, big shot rich boy huh?” Vic is trying very unsuccessfully to hide his smile. Dick’s getting so flustered and it’s so _funny_. “Don’t forget, my parents weren’t exactly slouches themselves.” The son of a scientist and an inventor—and here he is, arguing about something so simple as an algebra problem.

“Can I get my paper back,” Raven asks, and it’s not long before she gives up, floating off to her room. By the time Donna and Gar get home an hour later, he and Dick are still at it.

  
Raven invites him and Gar out to eat, and spends the whole night picking at her food, watching them from the corners of her eyes. When Gar, the intolerable chatterbox, asks what’s wrong, she says, “People are looking at me.”

They’re looking at Vic, actually, because a robot person is always going to be more shocking than an unfortunate hairline. Either way, he finds himself shielding her from view, sitting on the outside of the booth while she sits on the inside. Somehow it’s easier to bear the brunt of unwanted attention, when he sees Raven actually smile.

Gar, on the ride home, looks down at his lap. His fingers twist and pull at the fabric of his pants. “I don’t think they were looking at her,” he mumbles. 

For some reason, it hadn’t registered to him that Gar is green. That maybe they were more interested in him than Vic.

Relief wells up in him and it makes him feel sick. He wouldn’t wish this on anyone, especially not his best friend.

“Probably because you’re so loud.”

Gar doesn’t smile, but his frown lightens and Vic supposes maybe that’s all he can do for the moment.

The next night, he and Donna go and visit Dick at work, call him Richard which is super weird, and take advantage of the low light.

They talk about Gar and Raven, and Donna says she’s going to suggest getting haircuts soon. “You don’t have to get one, but I think a change would be good for the both of them.”

“Oh please, don’t act like you’re not just doing this ‘cause you hair their hairdos,” Vic scoffs, but he’s smiling. They’re coming a little easier these days. Still, he doesn’t dare look down at where his hand’s curled around his soda.

“I don’t!”

“Uh-huh, sure you don’t.”

For a long moment, they stare at each other, waiting for one to back down. Figuring Amazons know a thing or two about fortitude, Vic takes a sip.

“If Raven just did anything but slick it back—”

Vic almost chokes, and when Dick comes over, concerned, Vic just waves him away. It’s nice of him to come over, and maybe Vic’ll leave enough cereal for him to have a bowl in the morning (mid-afternoon, really), but seriously. He’s fine. He’s pretty sure robots can’t choke to death. 

It’s not something he wants to think about, now or ever.

“I’ll be there,” he says eventually, “But no way in hell am I cutting my hair.”

Kory is tall, as tall as him, and her hair is the biggest he’s ever seen before, and her smile is bright and sharp. Her skin is legitimately golden. She has no pupils, her eyes as green as glow sticks. She looks more alien than him and Gar put together, and somehow—somehow she doesn’t even notice. Doesn’t even seem to care. 

He spots a gnarly scar on her leg, and looks away before she can see him look.

Still, she can tell something is wrong. “Is something wrong, Victor?”

Donna is staring at them, and her eyes are glued to Kory, and it feels weird that no one is looking at him. He wonders if he shouldn’t warn her that she’s always catching eyes everywhere they go, even their own private pool.

“Nah,” he says finally, when the curiosity starts to morph into worry. “I’m good.”

“Don’t say you’re distracted, Stone!” Dick calls from the jumping board, as if he has literally any ground to stand on at all. Of the two of them, it wasn’t Vic who conked his head on a wall yesterday ‘cause Kory just looked so good in her new sweatpants.

“Not a bit, _Richard_! Not a bit! Try not to smack your ass on the board, by the way!”

“Ohhh,” Gar goads.

“Can’t we go one freaking day without you two bickering,” Donna complains, and her voice is drowned out by Dick’s splash. Which just so happens to be big enough to get Vic soaking wet. 

Kory laughs and jumps in, and Vic gets the extreme satisfaction of watching her splash Dick right back.

Her hair is still wet when they go out to get pizza for everyone. Three of Donna’s hairbands snapped when they tried to wrangle her curls, so they hang around her shoulders all the way to the parlor and all the way back.

Everyone stares at them. 

Vic isn’t wearing a hat or gloves today, and he feels sick to his stomach, which is impossible because he doesn’t have a real stomach anymore—well, he has the organ, but the phrase isn’t meant so literally. And he’s pretty sure that metal stomachs can’t feel sick. But his does. 

“Something’s wrong,” Kory guesses, peeking over at him.

“Nothing’s wrong,” he says, which is a total fucking lie, but he doesn’t know this girl. She’s only been able to speak English for a week and a half. She’s holding her half of the pizza boxes like they’re going to blow up in her face if she steps on the sidewalk wrong. He’s pretty sure opening up to her won’t go well.

But she surprises him. She says, “You don’t have to lie to me, you know. Maybe I don’t understand everything about this place yet, but I’m not stupid.”

“Of course you aren’t,” he says, because he hates when his friends talk down about themselves. Donna and Dick have welcomed her into the group easily, and it’s not like Raven and Gar are against her. Maybe they aren’t friends yet, but it won’t be long.

He still doesn’t want to open up to her, though.

She smiles at him, closed lip and he wonders if she’s noticed that her normal one—with her blinding teeth on display—makes normal people shy away. “You’re sweet. And avoiding.”

“I’m not avoiding,” he says. “Hey, how do you feel about baseball?”

“I don’t know what baseball is.”

He explains the rest of the way home, and gets Gar started on how much he hates the Mets, and basically makes sure Kory can’t call him out on his shit the rest of the night.

They’re in the infirmary. Dick is passed out on one of the beds, and Donna is in the shower trying to wash a literal ton of dust out of her hair. Gar is chowing down on one of the nasty protein bars, and Raven is asleep upstairs.

Kory is staring at him.

“What?”

“Did that hurt?” She asks, gesturing on her own chest where flesh and metal meet on his. When he looks down at it, there’s no immediate wave of nausea, and for some reason the absence of it hits him harder than the actual thing.

“No,” he says. It didn’t. He wasn’t awake when it happened. He wasn’t even really alive. 

He’s kind of glad he lived—wouldn’t have gotten to meet these people if not—but it still feels like an open wound, his not-death.

“Oh.”

She touches a scar on her arm, one that looks thick and deep, and it resembles his own but he thinks she wasn’t lucky enough to be unconscious when she got it. He isn’t sure when he started to think he was lucky, that day that his mom died and his dad turned him into this—this thing.

A weird sort of pride wells in him when he sees Kory’s modelling photos.

“Do you like them?” She asks, uncharacteristically embarrassed as the four of them take in Donna’s handiwork. 

“They’re amazing,” Dick says, because of course he does.

“You look perfect,” Gar says, because of course he does.

“I like this one the best,” Raven says, pointing to the one where Kory is dressed in black jeans and a black turtleneck. Because of course she does.

All Vic sees, when he looks at the pictures, is his friend’s radiant smile. 

“I love them,” he says, and then, because of course, he turns to Donna. She’s bouncing on her toes, eyes scanning all of them for their reactions. “Do you think you could do one of these with me?”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! If you enjoyed, please consider leaving a comment! <3


End file.
